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This is fundamentally one of the biggest cultural changes we have to make. You have to be ok with talking about your personal earning. In a lot of places talkin

This is fundamentally one of the biggest cultural changes we have to make. You have to be ok with talking about your personal earning. In a lot of places talking about earnings is more taboo then talking about sex, and sex is generally taboo. Company culture of not talking about earnings only helps the company. It allows them to pay lowest market value for anyone, under the (often true) hopes that they don't know their value. In short talk about it, and get other people to talk about it. I would talk with your co-workers get them to open up about what they make, or have the breach subject in the conversation group while the other person can hear. Talk about what you used to make and what you make now. The key if to give everyone more context. Its important to remember that someones value as a person is not their market price. The more information a person has available, the better the choices they can make. [$47/hr, 2 years out of college, east coast]

sirwolfgang 12y ago
And in response to the valuation, they could of changed their math; But in the last two years most economies have had growth, so that value to go up to adjust for growth and inflation. The only real reason I can think of that value going down is much more supply to the work force, which I know isn't that true.
joshyeager 12y ago
The big reason for the taboo against talking about income is jealousy. Almost every job feels harder than it looks, and almost everyone feels more skilled at their work than they look. So if you tell someone your salary, your job probably feels more difficult to you than it looks to them, and you probably feel more productive than they think you are. If you make the same or more than they do, there is a very high risk that they will think you are overpaid. This is obviously a risk to the company, which is why most companies (at least in the US) have a policy against it. But it is also a risk to you and your relationship with that other person, which is why few people share their salary information with their friends. You are right that this is a fundamental problem for equality. But it is not an easy or safe thing to change, which means it will take a lot of time and effort. I am not saying that the status quo should remain. I'm just pointing out the reason it is difficult to change.
- cenazoic 12y ago
  Read patio11's words on this: "We have strong cultural training to not ask about salary, ever. This is not universal. In many cultures, professional contexts are a perfectly appropriate time to discuss money... If I were a Marxist academic or a conspiracy theorist, I might think that this bit of middle class American culture was specifically engineered to be in the interests of employers and against the interests of employees." (Don't Call Yourself a Programmer: www.kalzumeus.com/2011/10/28/dont-call-yourself-a-programmer/)
- sqrt17 12y ago
  From the other side of the curtain, most companies have "salary bands" that they apply semi-uniformly, i.e., as a "junior developer" you can make from X1-10% to X1+10%, as a "senior developer" you can make from X2-10% to X2+10%, and as a "project manager" you can make from X3-10% to X3+10%. The invisible hand of the market will lead prople to companies with the highest value for X2, which are usually also those where the productivity (i.e. contribution to company revenue) per person is highest.
- Amezarak 12y ago
  > This is obviously a risk to the company, which is why most companies (at least in the US) have a policy against it. What's amazing to me is that every company I've ever known of has a policy along those lines, yet it is illegal to sanction employees for talking about their pay with coworkers under the National Labor Relations Act and has been for a long, long time. I also wonder to what extent the jealousy argument applies in the real world. It makes sense, and I'm sympathetic to it, but I've worked at two jobs where it was pretty well known what everyone made. There were huge disparities in what people made for doing the same work in both cases. It didn't cause any resentment issues I know of - but I suspect it did make people more likely to ask for a raise when they knew what was possible, which I think is the problem that management really has with it, because it becomes much harder for them to justify to the employee why they can't or won't pay them more, even though there may be valid reasons for it.
- bowlich 12y ago
  I started my career in the public sector where salary is published and set in stone before you even apply for a position. Everyone knows everyone's pay grade. I never once saw any kind of jealousy about someone making more than someone else for doing the same job title. This has two effects (1) Saves me a lot of time on the negotiation front. If the announcement doesn't pay what you want, don't apply to it. Saves me and the hiring manager a lot of wasted time if I were to apply to a post thinking I'll get paid $X when it will really pay $Y. And (2) Since it's all public anyway, everyone knows that if you want to make $X then you need to train into position Y and you have a pretty concrete list of knowledge/skills that you can hack away on to achieve that. None of this blind guess work.
oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
Agreed 100%. I find the "don't talk about it" culture surrounding pay in companies pretty disgraceful. In a more civilised future, I'm pretty confident all pay will be totally open and public, and a swathe of problems will be solved as a result. Sure, there will be an awkward transition period, but progress is usually challenging. [38K, ~15years experience, tiny non-technical startup in London]
- SEJeff 12y ago
  British Pounds or USD? If most of the people are talking in USD, then you're making roughly 76k USD.
  - jebus989 12y ago
    Less roughly 38k GBP ~= 61k USD. It's been a good half-decade since it was two dollars to the pound.
    - DanBC 12y ago
      Also taxes. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rates-and-allowances-income-tax/rates-and-allowances-income-tax https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rates-and-allowan...
Bahamut 12y ago
People need to be ok with talking about it, but at the same time, it still should ultimately be each person's choice to talk about it. [$67/hr, 2 years of experience, senior frontend engineer, Palo Alto]
- Regnad 12y ago
  Not to pry, but is this typical on the West Coast or are you contracting/including bonus in your hourly? I think I do pretty well for my age but you're killing it. [$46/hr, 5 years of experience, Software Engineer, Boston]
  - sirwolfgang 12y ago
    You have to adjust for cost of living. There is a lot of cost of living over there then compared to around Boston.
  - Bahamut 12y ago
    I did not include a signing bonus or equity in that number - I am probably an unusual case admittedly due to my speed of learning and speed of execution
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  Varies by job; currently around that but as a consultant/contractor my rack rate was $150/hr with discounts for big projects down to $100/hr. [30 yrs experience, embedded, network and wireless, midwest ]
- patio11 12y ago
  Charge more. Just humor me and pitch the next client at $125/hr, which is more in line with market in your neck of the woods. (And the necessity for this post, folks, is one of the many, many mechanisms by which a norm of salaries being hidden screws over employees via information asymmetry.)
  - Bahamut 12y ago
    I'm not a contractor - if I were contracting, I'd definitely charge around that rate.
agilebyte 12y ago
Company culture of not talking about earnings helps me not feeling bad if I were to find out that my colleague who does the same job is paid more, or be on the reverse end. I'd rather not know. On the other hand, differences between different companies I can explain/comprehend/think are useful.
- laurenbee 12y ago
  But what if knowing lets you make moves that improve your salary (if you are on the lower end) or encourage your coworkers to ask for a raise (if you are on the higher end)? I started out making 10% more than what I was initially offered since I knew what coworkers with similar experience made and asked for that amount. And I know what coworkers with much more experience (10+ years to my 2 years) make, so I can gauge whether I am on the right track.
  - agilebyte 12y ago
    Congratulations. Salary negotiations is not an area I am good at, and I guess I don't need a constant reminder about that wondering what if because the benefits a job gives us is a complex issue.
Igglyboo 12y ago
A lot of people are just plain uncomfortable talking about it because in a lot of places your projected image is tied to how much you make. [$25/hr, software developer, 6 months until graduation, midwest]
R_Edward 12y ago
On my first day at one job, HR called me into a conference room to review my compensation package and everything. The HR rep wrote a number on a Post-It and handed it to me, saying, "This is your salary. Here at BigCo we hold salary in confidence between you and the company. In other words, please do not discuss this number with any of your co-workers." I responded, "Don't worry, ma'am. I'm just as ashamed of that small number as you are." [low 6 figures, 28 years experience, Upper Midwest]
chinks81 12y ago
|his is fundamentally one of the biggest cultural changes we have to make. You have to be ok with talking about your personal earning. In a lot of places talking about earnings is more taboo then talking about sex, and sex is generally taboo. I seriously loathe "inherently stupid" like you. Neither you nor OP knows actual components of package offered to new hires. Let's take gender out of picture for a moment. Now think, how many times you have seen posts coming out from such shitposters because "less salary" was offered to "male" or H1B developers ? Show me at least five. Things change in two years. May be company does not have as much revenue/profit or "demand of new hire" as it had two years back. So you literally want to make everyone state their salary ? Do you have any idea how much political environment we all play in ? How many people will literally stab in back for earning $1 more than them ? Because 99 % human nature is such that I work hard than anyone else then why S/He be paid more than me ? We don;t think about background, education, training required to get to speed, expected time to active contribution etc etc. Are you white ? In reality what you are saying is commonly known as "White Knighting". You are not going to get any more pussy by white knighting. Sure you will make more enemies. This might sound bitter to you but I am speaking truth and Mate, truth hurts.

sirwolfgang 12y ago

And in response to the valuation, they could of changed their math; But in the last two years most economies have had growth, so that value to go up to adjust for growth and inflation. The only real reason I can think of that value going down is much more supply to the work force, which I know isn't that true.

joshyeager 12y ago

The big reason for the taboo against talking about income is jealousy. Almost every job feels harder than it looks, and almost everyone feels more skilled at their work than they look. So if you tell someone your salary, your job probably feels more difficult to you than it looks to them, and you probably feel more productive than they think you are. If you make the same or more than they do, there is a very high risk that they will think you are overpaid. This is obviously a risk to the company, which is why most companies (at least in the US) have a policy against it. But it is also a risk to you and your relationship with that other person, which is why few people share their salary information with their friends. You are right that this is a fundamental problem for equality. But it is not an easy or safe thing to change, which means it will take a lot of time and effort. I am not saying that the status quo should remain. I'm just pointing out the reason it is difficult to change.

cenazoic 12y ago
Read patio11's words on this: "We have strong cultural training to not ask about salary, ever. This is not universal. In many cultures, professional contexts are a perfectly appropriate time to discuss money... If I were a Marxist academic or a conspiracy theorist, I might think that this bit of middle class American culture was specifically engineered to be in the interests of employers and against the interests of employees." (Don't Call Yourself a Programmer: www.kalzumeus.com/2011/10/28/dont-call-yourself-a-programmer/)
sqrt17 12y ago
From the other side of the curtain, most companies have "salary bands" that they apply semi-uniformly, i.e., as a "junior developer" you can make from X1-10% to X1+10%, as a "senior developer" you can make from X2-10% to X2+10%, and as a "project manager" you can make from X3-10% to X3+10%. The invisible hand of the market will lead prople to companies with the highest value for X2, which are usually also those where the productivity (i.e. contribution to company revenue) per person is highest.
Amezarak 12y ago
> This is obviously a risk to the company, which is why most companies (at least in the US) have a policy against it. What's amazing to me is that every company I've ever known of has a policy along those lines, yet it is illegal to sanction employees for talking about their pay with coworkers under the National Labor Relations Act and has been for a long, long time. I also wonder to what extent the jealousy argument applies in the real world. It makes sense, and I'm sympathetic to it, but I've worked at two jobs where it was pretty well known what everyone made. There were huge disparities in what people made for doing the same work in both cases. It didn't cause any resentment issues I know of - but I suspect it did make people more likely to ask for a raise when they knew what was possible, which I think is the problem that management really has with it, because it becomes much harder for them to justify to the employee why they can't or won't pay them more, even though there may be valid reasons for it.
bowlich 12y ago
I started my career in the public sector where salary is published and set in stone before you even apply for a position. Everyone knows everyone's pay grade. I never once saw any kind of jealousy about someone making more than someone else for doing the same job title. This has two effects (1) Saves me a lot of time on the negotiation front. If the announcement doesn't pay what you want, don't apply to it. Saves me and the hiring manager a lot of wasted time if I were to apply to a post thinking I'll get paid $X when it will really pay $Y. And (2) Since it's all public anyway, everyone knows that if you want to make $X then you need to train into position Y and you have a pretty concrete list of knowledge/skills that you can hack away on to achieve that. None of this blind guess work.

oneeyedpigeon 12y ago

Agreed 100%. I find the "don't talk about it" culture surrounding pay in companies pretty disgraceful. In a more civilised future, I'm pretty confident all pay will be totally open and public, and a swathe of problems will be solved as a result. Sure, there will be an awkward transition period, but progress is usually challenging. [38K, ~15years experience, tiny non-technical startup in London]

SEJeff 12y ago
British Pounds or USD? If most of the people are talking in USD, then you're making roughly 76k USD.
- jebus989 12y ago
  Less roughly 38k GBP ~= 61k USD. It's been a good half-decade since it was two dollars to the pound.
  - DanBC 12y ago
    Also taxes. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rates-and-allowances-income-tax/rates-and-allowances-income-tax https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rates-and-allowan...

Bahamut 12y ago

People need to be ok with talking about it, but at the same time, it still should ultimately be each person's choice to talk about it. [$67/hr, 2 years of experience, senior frontend engineer, Palo Alto]

Regnad 12y ago
Not to pry, but is this typical on the West Coast or are you contracting/including bonus in your hourly? I think I do pretty well for my age but you're killing it. [$46/hr, 5 years of experience, Software Engineer, Boston]
- sirwolfgang 12y ago
  You have to adjust for cost of living. There is a lot of cost of living over there then compared to around Boston.
- Bahamut 12y ago
  I did not include a signing bonus or equity in that number - I am probably an unusual case admittedly due to my speed of learning and speed of execution
JoeAltmaier 12y ago
Varies by job; currently around that but as a consultant/contractor my rack rate was $150/hr with discounts for big projects down to $100/hr. [30 yrs experience, embedded, network and wireless, midwest ]
patio11 12y ago
Charge more. Just humor me and pitch the next client at $125/hr, which is more in line with market in your neck of the woods. (And the necessity for this post, folks, is one of the many, many mechanisms by which a norm of salaries being hidden screws over employees via information asymmetry.)
- Bahamut 12y ago
  I'm not a contractor - if I were contracting, I'd definitely charge around that rate.

agilebyte 12y ago

Company culture of not talking about earnings helps me not feeling bad if I were to find out that my colleague who does the same job is paid more, or be on the reverse end. I'd rather not know. On the other hand, differences between different companies I can explain/comprehend/think are useful.

laurenbee 12y ago
But what if knowing lets you make moves that improve your salary (if you are on the lower end) or encourage your coworkers to ask for a raise (if you are on the higher end)? I started out making 10% more than what I was initially offered since I knew what coworkers with similar experience made and asked for that amount. And I know what coworkers with much more experience (10+ years to my 2 years) make, so I can gauge whether I am on the right track.
- agilebyte 12y ago
  Congratulations. Salary negotiations is not an area I am good at, and I guess I don't need a constant reminder about that wondering what if because the benefits a job gives us is a complex issue.

Igglyboo 12y ago

A lot of people are just plain uncomfortable talking about it because in a lot of places your projected image is tied to how much you make. [$25/hr, software developer, 6 months until graduation, midwest]

R_Edward 12y ago

On my first day at one job, HR called me into a conference room to review my compensation package and everything. The HR rep wrote a number on a Post-It and handed it to me, saying, "This is your salary. Here at BigCo we hold salary in confidence between you and the company. In other words, please do not discuss this number with any of your co-workers." I responded, "Don't worry, ma'am. I'm just as ashamed of that small number as you are." [low 6 figures, 28 years experience, Upper Midwest]

chinks81 12y ago

|his is fundamentally one of the biggest cultural changes we have to make. You have to be ok with talking about your personal earning. In a lot of places talking about earnings is more taboo then talking about sex, and sex is generally taboo. I seriously loathe "inherently stupid" like you. Neither you nor OP knows actual components of package offered to new hires. Let's take gender out of picture for a moment. Now think, how many times you have seen posts coming out from such shitposters because "less salary" was offered to "male" or H1B developers ? Show me at least five. Things change in two years. May be company does not have as much revenue/profit or "demand of new hire" as it had two years back. So you literally want to make everyone state their salary ? Do you have any idea how much political environment we all play in ? How many people will literally stab in back for earning $1 more than them ? Because 99 % human nature is such that I work hard than anyone else then why S/He be paid more than me ? We don;t think about background, education, training required to get to speed, expected time to active contribution etc etc. Are you white ? In reality what you are saying is commonly known as "White Knighting". You are not going to get any more pussy by white knighting. Sure you will make more enemies. This might sound bitter to you but I am speaking truth and Mate, truth hurts.